Stocks A to Z / Stocks B / Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A)
No. of Recommendations: 7
$25M for 2026
Just saw this on COBF:
https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/10...We’ve been spoiled with Warren taking peanuts of $100K/ year for nearly 50 years.
Abel will be receiving a 20-25% pay raise as CEO & all that comes with overseeing a a $1.1T complex conglomerate? I’m fine with that.
No. of Recommendations: 1
Abel will be receiving a 20-25% pay raise as CEO
It's a 19% increase from his 2025 salary of $21 million.
No. of Recommendations: 16
It's peanuts compared to Jamie Dimon who's total compensation for 2025 was $770 million. Yes, you read that correctly. Obnoxious in my opinion.
No. of Recommendations: 5
It's peanuts compared to Jamie Dimon who's total compensation for 2025 was $770 million
Agree 💯
Abel's salary fairly modest and I am thrilled.
No. of Recommendations: 17
It's peanuts compared to Jamie Dimon who's total compensation for 2025 was $770 million
...
Abel's salary fairly modest and I am thrilled.
Still a lot. Watch out for cognitive biases like anchoring.
I am not saying I would veto it if given the chance, Mr Abel seems like a good pick, but it's above S&P 500 median direct comp of around $17m, and the median CEO is overpaid, so I wouldn't call it "modest".
Jim
No. of Recommendations: 6
"It's peanuts compared to Jamie Dimon who's total compensation for 2025 was $770 million"
Jamie didn't "make" $700 million in compensation for 2025. Most of the number above was from the dollar value of gains from shares he has held forever. It would be like saying Warren "made x $" in a year when his Berkshire holdings increased significantly due to a rising share price.
"Dimon started off 2025 with about 7.3 million shares. With a per-share price of $239.71, his stake was valued at roughly $1.8 billion. The stock price soared to $322.22 at the end of 2025, pushing the stock value of his stake up to about $2.4 billion, which meant Dimon saw about $605.6 million in appreciation plus another $40 million in dividends. This year, he’ll see a 1.5 million stock appreciation right grant vest due to a special one-time award the board gave him in 2021. All told, through stock value gains, dividends, and compensation, Dimon will see about $770 million for his work in 2025, according to reporting by the New York Times that was verified for Fortune by independent compensation firm Farient Advisors."
No. of Recommendations: 14
Abel's salary fairly modest
Relative to some others: Maybe.
In absolute terms: That depends on your world view. In mine it´s obscene if somebody earns several hundred times what the average worker/employee in that country earns, no matter how often it´s said "He is worth it".
Capitalism works like that, yes --- but can I please nevertheless find it obscene and dislike capitalism´s excesses?
No. of Recommendations: 4
Abel's $25M salary divided by an estimate of the number of Berkshire Hathaway employees comes to ~$60/employee per year.
Looked at another way, his salary divided by an estimate of the number of shareholder accounts, it's less than ~$10/shareholder per year.
Frankly, it could be $100M and it still wouldn't materially affect anyone.
People spend far too much time and energy angsting over executive pay. Much of it seems like merely a form of virtue signaling.
No. of Recommendations: 28
Frankly, it could be $100M and it still wouldn't materially affect anyone.
That isn't really the point. I would say that there are vanishingly few executives worth more than (say) $5m/year for the work they do in their day jobs. Mr Buffett was, maybe a few others. The rest of the pay is because they can get away with it--it's not much per shareholder, everybody else is doing it, and there is a myth that bigger companies need more expensive bosses. That latter is definitely a big contributor to wealth-destroying M&A and empire building.
A bigger company is in many important ways easier to run than a smaller one, not harder. People help you, the blame is diffuse if you need that cover, and a big firm is generally much more resilient to shocks. Sure, the absolute amounts to be made or lost by the company through management decisions are bigger at a big company, but that rarely affects the money of the boss. They still have the same number of hours in a week as a boss at a smaller place.
Jim
No. of Recommendations: 3
Warren would disagree :
"A Bargain": In 2014, after Dimon's pay was raised, Buffett stated that if he owned JPMorgan, he would pay Dimon more, calling him a "bargain".
I forgot it was that long ago. Time flies.
No. of Recommendations: 4
Warren would disagree :
"A Bargain": In 2014, after Dimon's pay was raised, Buffett stated that if he owned JPMorgan, he would pay Dimon more, calling him a "bargain".
He was, then. At least by comparison. His pay the that year was $20 million including options.
Jim
No. of Recommendations: 0
no debate but $5m as you suggested is way too low for a CEO. I had a few years where I made double that and I wasn't a CEO.
No. of Recommendations: 13
I am not saying I would veto it if given the chance, Mr Abel seems like a good pick, but it's above S&P 500 median direct comp of around $17m, and the median CEO is overpaid, so I wouldn't call it "modest".
I am sure you realize that Abel's total comp is going to be $25 million in 2026 since Berkshire doesn't pay him any stock based comp unlike every other S&P 500 CEO. Secondly, Berkshire is not any other S&P 500 company, it's one of the top 10 by market capitalization and the largest in terms of PP&E investments.
Abel's comp is only "not modest" by the standards of Warren's comp when he was CEO. We shareholders should be thankful that we have such a competent CEO working for us for quite a reasonably modest comp.
No. of Recommendations: 3
“Excessive” is a relative term. Sure, Warren’s unchanged $100k salary was an accident of the company’s unique history and culture. But it’s exactly this comparative “excess” that’s been in my thought as a long term shareholder. Anyway I think about it, it’s a discontinuity in culture. And it’s more than optics.
Annual Salary aside, what I’ll be watching for is the personal stock ownership of Greg, Ajit and others on the Board. Warren held over 30% of the company at peak and that’s a gold standard in corporate history. What I would really like to see, over time, is meaningfully increasing levels of ownership by the board, including Greg and his successor. With their own money. Just like the rest of the shareholders have. Cunningham had flagged this ownership issue in his recent book.
Keep us spoilt.
No. of Recommendations: 7
Brandon:
It's peanuts compared to Jamie Dimon who's total compensation for 2025 was $770 million. Yes, you read that correctly. Obnoxious in my opinion.
The slightest facility with Google yields the information that the $770 million reported was over 90% due to appreciation of JPMorgan stock he already owned, not from salary or bonuses.
Measured the same way, your working class hero Warren Buffett's "total compensation" for the last 5 years AVERAGED over $12 BILLION (with a B) a year leaving that obnoxious elitist Jamie Dimon in the dust under his heels.
Further bolstering Jamie's working class cred over Warren's:
Jamie earned ~ 0.1% of what JPMorgan earned per year
Warren earned ~ 15-20% of what Berkshire Hathaway per year.
Obnoxious, isn't it? I think not, personally.
R:)
No. of Recommendations: 10
Said:
Capitalism works like that, yes --- but can I please nevertheless find it obscene and dislike capitalism´s excesses?
You have my permission, as long as you only invest in companies whos CEO makes less than or equal to what you think is reasonable.
The fact that you will make MUCH LESS on your stock holdings will be a small price to pay for being true to your moral superiority!
R:)
No. of Recommendations: 5
Mungofitch:
I would say that there are vanishingly few executives worth more than (say) $5m/year for the work they do in their day jobs. The rest of the pay is because they can get away with it--it's not much per shareholder, everybody else is doing it, and there is a myth that bigger companies need more expensive bosses.
If this came from a lot of people I would just dismiss it as ignorance of things like how rare true management talent is, how easy it is for the "wrong" CEO to reduce corporate returns by billions of dollars, and how economics suggests that ANY scarce resource will have its cost bid up to something approaching the value it enables unless, unlike virtually everything else in the economic world, it is not subject to being bid for.
Coming from Jim, I expect there is at bare minimum a coherent theory that differs from what I daresay is the usual in market driven hiring of CEOs and its moral or immoral basis. I would love to know what that alternative is.
To be clear, I would submit your claim above is that JP Morgan could go out and easily hire someone for $5Million a year which replacement would not reduce the earnings of JP Morgan by even as much as 0.01%. Or that once JP Morgan and accomplished that feat, that this individual would not be offered 10X or even 100X of his $5Million compensation at JPMorgan by other companies to be their CEO.
The 0.01% is not arbitrarily chosen. Dimon's 2024 compensation was about $39 million while JP Morgan earned $58.5 BILLION. So if replacing Dimon with a $5Million dollar CEO reduced earnings to $58.45 Billion or less, it would be a net negative to shareholders.
I am curious, do you actually think there are a bunch of $5Million dollar CEO candidates who would predictably do as well as or better than Jamie Dimon at running JP Morgan? If so, could you comment on which of my assumptions are wrong and why you think that?
Thanks,
R:)
No. of Recommendations: 35
I would say that there are vanishingly few executives worth more than (say) $5m/year for the work they do in their day jobs. The rest of the pay is because they can get away with it--it's not much per shareholder, everybody else is doing it, and there is a myth that bigger companies need more expensive bosses.
...
To be clear, I would submit your claim above is that JP Morgan could go out and easily hire someone for $5Million a year which replacement would not reduce the earnings of JP Morgan by even as much as 0.01%. Or that once JP Morgan and accomplished that feat, that this individual would not be offered 10X or even 100X of his $5Million compensation at JPMorgan by other companies to be their CEO.
As it happens, Mr Dimon was one of the people I had in mind when I said "vanishingly few" rather than "one". I haven't actually followed his career that closely, so I don't have a good feel for how much the success of the firm has been the result of his personal efforts versus the efforts of the other top executives, the other 300,000 employees, or the fact of what position they hold in which industry. I have heard good things about the fellow's skill so I allow for the notion that his efforts have been important. Normally the bosses of successful already-large firms are simply the people who happened to be marching in front of a parade rather than leading it.
There are *lots* of very smart and capable people out there. The myth of the rare genius is very much over hyped. Yes, there are a few exceptional outliers...but not many. It would be silly to start with the notion that the CEOs getting the most pay are worth the most pay, (or that the CEO ought to be the highest paid person in a firm), since skill in the CEO role is such a vanishingly small part of the process of getting to be one of them. As but one random example, if you don't found the firm yourself, you better be tall if you want to be in charge. Psychopathy helps a lot, too.
Does anyone seriously think that it wouldn't be possible to get a more competent boss at Meta for $5 million a year? The clue is in the company name.
As a reminder of the ease with which one can mistake the success of a business for skill of the boss, remember Mr Buffett's warning: “When a management with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.” Think deeply about WHY that is so...the economics of the business are utterly dominant, not the actions of the boss. Believing otherwise is usually a bit of flimsy "post hoc ergo propter hoc" reasoning.
Jim
No. of Recommendations: 0
Today's CEO compensation is similar to hedge fund fee, a small number earn the fee by making investors richer, majority earn the money from investors.
No. of Recommendations: 1
" As a reminder of the ease with which one can mistake the success of a business for skill of the boss, remember Mr Buffett's warning: “When a management with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.” Think deeply about WHY that is so...the economics of the business are utterly dominant, not the actions of the boss. Believing otherwise is usually a bit of flimsy "post hoc ergo propter hoc" reasoning.
Jim"
Good morning old bud, you continue to shock some of us. Think back to when Buffett was vigorously supporting Ginny, did she earn her compensation? Did the team that replaced her, earn their compensation?
I worry about you bro. :)
No. of Recommendations: 0
Employee performance is diverse, some worth the earning, some don't. For all categories of jobs, the average expected worth of employees' work are higher than the average expected compensation, with the possible exception of CEOs and politicians.
No. of Recommendations: 8
You have my permission, as long as you only invest in companies whos CEO makes less than or equal to what you think is reasonable.
The fact that you will make MUCH LESS on your stock holdings will be a small price to pay for being true to your moral superiority!
Your logic seems to go like this:
- Said finds X obscene and dislikes it
- With this point of view Said sees himself to be morally superior
- To be true to that superiority consequently Said must stay away from X
Where exactly did I claim "superiority"?
Where did I say more than finding X obscene and disliking it?
Why does that result in being forbidden to participate in things where I do not agree with all aspects --- as we all do dozens of times per week in our daily lives, doing things we dislike?
Life is not a coder´s wet dream, is not binary, 0 or 1.
No. of Recommendations: 7
“Normally the bosses of successful already-large firms are simply the people who happened to be marching in front of a parade rather than leading it.”
This is good writing.
I also remember previous comments from Buffett or Munger along the lines:
We like businesses that even a ham sandwich could run.
There was also a reference to a Berkshire subsidiary that had a CEO with dementia who ran it for years.
I’m going to add this - marching in front of a parade to my mental models. It’s a good one, thanks.
No. of Recommendations: 7
There are *lots* of very smart and capable people out there. The myth of the rare genius is very much over hyped. Yes, there are a few exceptional outliers...but not many. It would be silly to start with the notion that the CEOs getting the most pay are worth the most pay, (or that the CEO ought to be the highest paid person in a firm), since skill in the CEO role is such a vanishingly small part of the process of getting to be one of them. As but one random example, if you don't found the firm yourself, you better be tall if you want to be in charge.
I had a very tall relative who was the president of a major oil company. He once mused that "you could replace all the top execs in the oil business with some good MBA's and it would continue to run just fine". Later that week he had breakfast with the CEO of IBM, after which I drove out to the Nantucket airport, where we went through a private side entrance onto the runway and he hopped on the company jet to go to Alaska for some salmon fishing. Nice job if you can get it.
No. of Recommendations: 1
I also remember previous comments from Buffett or Munger along the lines:
We like businesses that even a ham sandwich could run.
How odd that people who like businesses that could be run by a ham sandwich, LOVE a business that they think deserves a decade long search for its next leaders?
R:
No. of Recommendations: 0
Said said:
Where exactly did I claim "superiority"?
Where did I say more than finding X obscene and disliking it?
Why does that result in being forbidden to participate in things where I do not agree with all aspects --- as we all do dozens of times per week in our daily lives, doing things we dislike?
"The word obscene, when used in the context of the pay gap between CEOs and workers, functions as a value judgment to describe an amount that is shocking, morally wrong, or offensive due to its extreme excessiveness." -Gemini AI
My apologies to Said. It never occurred to me that someone could publicly describe a system as morally wrong and offensive and then blithely expect to use it for his profit.
Point taken.
R:
No. of Recommendations: 1
Well. we are not alone.
WSJ carries a piece too, titled,
"Buffett's Berkshire Successor Set to Earn One of Top Salaries for an S&P 500 CEO"
The subtitle says a bit more,
"Greg Abel's $25 million salary is well above the median in total pay for big-company chiefs, though dozens of top CEO's earn more with stock and options awards"
Buffett and Munger's favorite topic here. What I have heard,
Ordinary companies pay with money taken (usurped) from shareholders pockets and keep taking it for years and years to come. "it's not an expense at all in modern accounting" "if not an expense, what the hell is it?" Berkshire pays it's leaders for actual performance with cash that the company has already earned; and tied as directly to said leader's direct contribution, separate from the economic tailwinds prevailing in the underlying industry. "we don't pay for simply breathing".
Expect Greg to face questions on this on May 2. Answering such questions will be a rite of passage thing. Beyond the salary issue, Greg will be defending the insinuation here of Berkshire's descent into ordinariness.
No. of Recommendations: 2
I happened to be sitting in a hotel hot tub with a guy whose "profession" was as an executive compensation consultant.
I stated that a great way for major corporations to both save money as well as become far more efficient (less meetings of large numbers of executives where most of their time was being wasted) was simple:
Fire the executives and double the salaries of their "administrative assistants" (who used to be called "secretaries" back in the day). These are the functionaries who actually kept most companies running in the name of their bosses while those bosses were off in their perpetual meetings.
He (maybe tongue in cheek) agreed with me, but pointed out he would be out of a job.
Before I retired, when I handed out Xmas gifts (things ranging from chocolate to scarves to leather gloves), they invariably went to administrative assistants, rather than their bosses.
Jeff
